


everything we left there

by hydrospanners



Series: renegade [22]
Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic
Genre: Angst, Gen, Mid-Class Story, Set during the immediate aftermath of the Fortress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-24
Updated: 2018-04-24
Packaged: 2019-04-26 13:36:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14403237
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hydrospanners/pseuds/hydrospanners
Summary: In the aftermath of her capture aboard the Emperor’s Fortress, Jedi Knight Nirea Velaran makes some hard decisions about her crew. Those decisions are not well-received.





	everything we left there

**Author's Note:**

> Originally posted on Tumblr (titled 'opal.') Written for Fictober 2016.

It’s well after midnight when Nirea returns to her room. Kira hasn’t seen her for days–-none of the crew has-–but the droids tell her this is the best time to catch her former master. They say she’s been sequestered all week, only leaving the Council chambers to nap.

She looks half a ghost. Slouched shoulders and pallid skin, shadows like bruises beneath her bloodshot eyes. She’s faded into an echo of herself.

Kira would feel worse about it if she wasn’t so furious.

Nirea isn’t surprised to find her, of course. Half the temple can probably sense her simmering rage. “Kira,” she says, not bothering to look her in the face, “You spoke to Rhese?”

Kira slams the necklace down on Rea’s desk. “He left me a message.” Her finger hovers over the opal pendant and the holo embedded in its backing. A part of her wants to play it, to make Rea face her brother’s despair, to see exactly what she did to him. But the message isn’t for Rea, and Kira isn’t angry enough that she’s willing to share this. “He didn’t have time for anything else. He was rushed to the spaceport directly from his debriefing.”

Rea settles onto the edge of her narrow bed and begins to strip the bits of armor from her body. She piles them neatly inside her footlocker, unhurried and silent.

Kira wants to strangle her. “You told the Council about us! You encouraged us, then you went behind our backs and told Satele!”

Rea doesn’t even flinch at the accusation. She barely seems to notice she isn’t alone in the room. Kira isn’t sure what she was expecting here, but it was something more than this. Something more than shouting at a duracrete wall.

“What about Doc, Rea? Did your hypocritical ass tell them about that too?” Seeing as he’s asleep in his quarters and not halfway to wherever the hell he came from, she’s willing to bet not.

“That’s done,” Rea finally says. “And anyway, it wasn’t the same thing.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It means it was nothing serious. Doc and I were just having sex.”

Stars. Rea’s always had her faults, but she never thought delusional would be one of them. “Are you sure he knows that?” She asks, a little sharper than she meant. “Or is there some other reason he’s been moping around like a kicked kath hound?”

Rea sucks in a breath, eyes snapping shut, and it’s more satisfying than Kira would like to admit to see her master shaken. She knows what this is all about, really. She knows better than anyone what Rea’s going through. But knowing doesn’t make it any easier. Knowing doesn’t make her betrayal hurt any less.

“Fine,” Kira says, once she realizes she’s already had everything she’s going to get from Rea. It’s not like she could undo what she did even if she wanted to, and adding to her misery isn’t making Kira feel any better about her own.

She turns to leave–-it’s well past midnight and she isn’t sure why she thought this was a good idea in the first place–-but Rea stops her with a hand on her wrist. In her other hand, she holds out the necklace. Her stony expression has softened, even if she’s looking anywhere but at Kira. “This was my aunt’s once,” she says, voice cracking around the edges.  “She gave it to her wife a few weeks before she died. An anniversary gift, I think. Rhese would only give this to someone who–-To someone he-–”

Rea’s hand falls away and she finally looks into Kira’s face, eyes burning with familiar intensity. She doesn’t seem a shadow now; she doesn’t echo with the damage that was done to her. In this moment, Nirea is perfectly herself, the force of nature Kira remembers.

“It was shitty what I did,” she says. Confesses, maybe. “But you need to know I didn’t do it because you love him or he loves you. What I did had nothing with you at all.” Rea pauses, dropping her gaze for just a moment. “I did it for me, Kira. Because _I_ love him. Because… if I have to choose between protecting Rhese and doing my job, I will choose Rhese every time. And I can’t afford that anymore. There’s too much riding on me. If I fuck up now, the whole damned galaxy is going to pay the price.”

Hard to argue with that.

“Maybe I should’ve done it differently, but you know he’d never leave by choice. He’s too good. Even if he thinks I’m doing everything wrong, he still wants to be here to help me do it. I can’t risk that, Kira. I can’t afford to lose him and I can’t afford to fuck up. What else was I supposed to do?”

Maybe try fucking talking to someone for once, is Kira’s first, uncharitable thought. Maybe she’s still a little raw about the direction things have gone since the Fortress. But her second, more reasonable thought is, Nothing.

It doesn’t feel great to admit, but Rea may be right about this. What she’s doing--what they’re all doing–-is so much more important than any one person. The crew knows that; they know this mission could very well cost them their lives and it’s a price they’re willing to pay. But if Rea isn’t willing to let them…

“You could’ve told me,” Kira says. “You could’ve at least let us say goodbye.”

Rea sighs, bowing her head in acknowledgement. “Well, for what it’s worth, I don’t think you should. Life’s too short to give up good things just because they’re against the rules.”

Kira has to physically restrain herself from rolling her eyes. “Please tell me you heard the irony there.”

“Look Kira, I’ve loved hundreds of different people in my life. Friends, family, random kids who just looked like they needed a hug. I even had a girlfriend I loved once. And I would’ve happily thrown my own life away for any of them, but there’s only one love I’d toss everything else for. One. Out of the hundreds of people I’ve loved, it’s just Rhese that makes me stupid.”

“Yeah,” Kira snorts. “He does that.”

“What I’m trying to say is–-Loving someone doesn’t always compromise your judgment, and you have to be the one who decides if it does or not. That’s not a call the Council can make for you.”

Finally, the last of Kira’s anger fizzles out. It’s not the catharsis she’s used to, letting her fury bounce off Rea ‘til it’s gone, but she thinks it’s a sort she can live with. The Fortress has changed them, has changed things between them, but she can make this work. And maybe she can make things work with Rhese too.

“You’re a pretty good wingman, you know that?”

“I know.” This time, Rea really does smile. “I’m incredible.”

Kira takes the necklace from her hand, gripping it tight as she rubs her thumb across the smooth surface of the opal. Maybe once they leave Tython she’ll be able to wear it. “I do have one more question.”

“Yeah?”

“I’m not being sent away too, am I?”

“What?” Rea frowns. “Of course not.”

“That mean you’re willing to let me die?”

The smile comes back, this time with an almost-laugh. “Not without a fight.”

“Teeseven too?”

Rea tilts her head thoughtfully, like she has to give it real consideration. “Good point,” she says. “Maybe I should tell Satele you’re sleeping with him, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> Will I ever get tired of writing about Rea being kind of a shitty master and Kira being angry and confused? Studies suggest 'No'.


End file.
